


When the World Stops (But Somehow Still Keeps Turning)

by IcyPanther



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Study, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Galaxy Garrison, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Mystery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-01
Updated: 2020-03-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:43:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22974217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IcyPanther/pseuds/IcyPanther
Summary: Veronica’s baby brother was dead. An accident, the Garrison told her, of Lance’s own making. As her family mourns and slowly begins to move on Veronica isn’t quite so wiling. Something isn’t right. The Garrison she has always served loyally is hiding something, perhaps even their own blood-stained, murderous hands. Veronica is going to get to the bottom of it and she’ll see justice served.Or; a re-telling of seasons one through seven through the eyes of Veronica Esposito reflecting on her youngest brother.
Relationships: Lance & Veronica (Voltron)
Comments: 36
Kudos: 235





	When the World Stops (But Somehow Still Keeps Turning)

**Author's Note:**

> **Timeline notes:** set between season one episode one until season seven episode  
>  **Warning notes:** none

**October 3, 2025**

“There has been an incident.”

Veronica knew that. Everyone at the Garrison knew that; it was quite hard to conceal the fact _something_ had crash landed on Earth not even two miles out from Garrison headquarters last night and that whatever it was hadn’t been normal because the entire compound had been put into not just a lockdown but a blackout so technology was absolutely useless. Veronica had smirked and wondered how Lance and his best friend Hunk were handling it as their video game system would have been affected too.

Veronica had spent nearly the past fourteen hours pacing her Garrison-issued common room with her two other roommates -- fellow first year officers -- speculating what it could be (an alien, Marcia had theorized, voice hushed with excitement, it had to be) and when they would be allowed out.

So Veronica hadn’t been surprised when finally, _finally,_ their door had been unlocked. 

She had been surprised that it was Commander Iverson, one of the highest ranked commanders in the Garrison, who had done so. He’d instructed Marcia and Leah to remain inside the building although they could vacate their room, but told Veronica to come with him and Marcia had flashed her a thumbs up and a mouthed “aliens” as Veronica left.

She tried not to get too excited that maybe they were bringing her on board; she was only a first year officer but she’d been working on several projects of note and her ability to analyze data and find patterns was in her own opinion very impressive. Maybe it was aliens and they wanted her to look at code? At their language?

Her hopes had continued as they brought her to Central Command and she rode the elevator to the restricted floor of Admiral Sanda and into a conference room off the Admiral’s office and then _Admiral Sanda herself_ had walked in with several other upper echelon. 

Veronica fought to keep her face impassive, saluting sharply, and standing at attention until she’d been instructed to sit.

“Last night at 2345 hours,” Admiral Sanda continued, her face betraying nothing, “a foreign object crashed into the desert one point eight five miles from headquarters. The Garrison was immediately placed on blackout and lockdown procedures for the safety of its students and staff as we determined if there was an active threat.”

Here Admiral Sanda paused and Veronica watched as she swallowed and her hands, previously held together in front of her, tightened enough so her knuckles whitened.

What…

What was going on?

Veronica’s excitement began to fade.

Something wasn’t right.

“Garrison personnel acted quickly to secure the scene while employing all safety measures and precautions. But…” Admiral Sanda paused again. “But several students who had violated curfew and then actively disobeyed all mandatory lockdown procedures entered the scene of the crash site.”

Why…

Why were they telling her this?

Admiral Sanda couldn’t be saying…

Veronica’s pulse thundered in her ears as the Admiral continued.

“--were not wearing proper protective gear and the heat and radiation from the crashed asteroid was at lethal levels--”

He couldn’t be…

He wouldn’t…

“--Garrison did all they could but--”

Her eyes locked on Veronica’s and there was something _sad_ locked in that cool blue gaze. 

Veronica could barely breathe.

No.

No.

“I am so sorry, Officer Esposito,” she said, her voice softer. “Your brother is dead.”

**October 5, 2025**

They had no body to bury.

Incinerated, the Garrison told them, by the heat. The only thing that remained was a charred and melted radio-like object that Pidge Gunderson, one of the other students’ had had in their possession. 

That was it.

Her brother was just…

Gone. 

Veronica still didn’t believe it.

She couldn’t believe it.

She’d seen Lance not even two days before, catching up with him on a lunch break. He’d been a bit down for him, even though he’d tried to hide it. And while Lance might be an excellent actor there was very little he could get by his big sister.

She’d managed to get out of him that he’d failed a big simulation test and Iverson had reamed him in front of the entire class. Veronica wished there was something she could do, could say to Iverson, but she had been through the Garrison’s sometimes too harsh training herself and knew it came with the program. She knew too how hard the last couple years had been as Lance had been passed over for the fighter pilot program -- his entire reason for wanting to join the Garrison -- and failing now at something in cargo class would hurt even more.

And while she couldn’t offer practical help (no piloting experience herself) or use her own standing to talk to his teachers (brown-nosing and bribery was highly, highly frowned upon) she could cheer him up.

Saturday, she’d told him, she’d take him off campus and they’d go for icecream and a movie -- he could pick -- at Garrison City. 

They were supposed to be there right now.

They weren’t.

Because Lance was dead.

Veronica prided herself on her logic, her reasoning, her cool and composed demeanor, especially compared to all of her siblings who, barring Luis, tended to be far more impulsive and passionate.

She had kept it together in Admiral Sanda’s conference room, finding her voice to make one request to see the crash site -- denied, too dangerous due to radiation -- and then she’d been escorted to the Admiral’s inner office so she could use the secured phone line -- one of only three still active with the blackout -- to call home.

She’d lost all of her composure then when Mamá had picked up.

She couldn’t tell them.

She couldn’t tell them their youngest son, her brother, was dead.

Admiral Sanda ended up plucking the phone from her and explaining to Mamá and Papá what had happened.

Veronica could still hear Mamá’s breathless sobs echoing over the phone. 

That was the last time she’d let herself cry. She needed to be strong now, to keep it together, as her family fell apart around her.

She’d been driven to the family home in a small town outside of Phoenix in a Garrison escort and had been there now for two days helping Luis put together funeral arrangements in a numb sort of haze. She didn’t want to be doing this; picking out flowers for the service, deciding what prayer Lance would have liked read, what photos should go on the memorial board and which ones they should frame (not his Garrison portrait, Mama had said through tears, anything but that one).

What she wanted were _answers._

Her brother wasn’t stupid. He was curious, yes, and had a bit of a reckless streak when it came to protecting others over himself, but even he wouldn’t have gone into a clearly dangerous area.

Right?

So what had Lance been doing out there? Why was he out past curfew? Why was his whole flight team there? 

Why…

Why did he have to die?

They were questions only one person had the answers to and he couldn’t give them.

Veronica’s hands tightened on the family photo album, one of the few photos they had from Cuba and showing Lance building a sandcastle with Luis and Rachel and his head thrown back, revealing a gap-toothed smile of pure joy, blurring under her gaze. 

He couldn’t be…

Not Lance.

Not their Lancito. 

She choked on the sob trying to come up her throat as tears she could no longer contain fell down her cheeks, splattering on the plastic over the photos.

It looked like it was raining.

Lance had loved the rain.

Her sobs came harder, glasses misting, and she brought one hand up to her mouth to muffle them from the rest of the family gathered in the kitchen.

She had not been as quiet as she’d hoped as there was the sound of a creaking floorboard to the bedroom she and Rachel used to share. She jerked her head up and found herself in Mamá’s embrace as she seated herself on the bed with Veronica.

“Oh, _mija,”_ Mamá murmured. 

She rocked them gently back and forth.

Veronica cried harder, turning and wrapping her arms tight about Mamá.

“He’s gone,” she choked out. “He’s gone. Mamá, he’s… he’s…”

“ _Ven,”_ Mamá whispered. _“Mija, ven conmigo. Ven a estar con tu familia._ Lance…” Mamá’s voice hitched. “Lance _no querría que estuvieras solo.”_

 _“Yo sé,_ ” Veronica whispered. 

Lance had loved his family. He’d loved spending time with them all.

He would not want her hidden away like this. 

She let Mamá lead her into the kitchen where the rest of her family was gathered.

And together they mourned. 

**December 25, 2025**

There was no taudy garland hung in the house this year. No mini santa hats on Mamá’s potted cacti. No lights strung every which way until Mamá unplugged them muttering about the electric bill although she would say nothing when Lance plugged them in again. No Christmas music blaring from the radio on the kitchen counter, no Lance singing along into the salt shaker. 

It had been a chore to set up their fake tree in the corner, harder still to decorate it and it showed with only a few strings of lights and some ornaments Sylvio and Nadia had made on its branches.

It just felt… wrong.

Christmas was wrong.

It had been Lance’s favorite holiday. 

It was a time to be together with family, to look back fondly on the year.

All Veronica could see was what was missing.

There was no Christmas cheer here.

There couldn’t be without Lance.

Veronica cast eyes about the room, landing on where Sylvio and Nadia were rolling a few balls of wrapping paper across the floor for the family’s cat, Gordito, but otherwise being quiet as they’d picked up on the more somber tone of the room.

It was wrong.

There should be laughter. And music and smiles and hugs and kisses and _joy._

There wasn’t.

And Lance…

Lance would be devastated if he saw them like this.

He hated to see people sad. 

“All right,” Veronica was surprised to hear herself speak. “That’s enough.”

She looked around the room, meeting pairs of eyes in the same ocean shade of Lance’s, in the warm brown from Papá. “That’s enough,” she said it again. “No more. Lance… Lance would hate this.”

Marco let out a wet sounding snort. “It is kind of a dull party, huh?”

“If Lance….” Veronica’s voice was thick but she pushed on. “If Lance were here right now do you know what he’d be doing?”

“Chucking presents at us,” Luis murmured. His hand tightened where he was holding tight to Lisa’s, a silent sob shaking his shoulders. “So we’d open his first.”

“Singing ‘jingle bells’,” Rachel sniffled. “Terribly offkey on purpose.”

“Eating way too many cookies for this early in the morning,” Marco whispered. The plate of store-bought ones, no one in the spirit to bake, sat at his elbow. He let out a choked sounding laugh. “As though Lancito needed sugar.”

“We… we should do those things,” Veronica said. “Bake cookies. Sing his favorite songs. It’ll be like… like…”

Like he was here with them.

“Excellent idea, _mija,”_ Mamá said softly. She stood and held out a hand to Rachel who was sitting on the couch next to her. “Come. We bake. Together.”

And they did.

They played the radio and sang carols and Marco and Sylvio decorated the cacti and Luis and Papá put up the lights outside and they shared their favorite stories of the holiday, and opened presents and they cried too but they did not dwell on it today.

And when Veronica crawled into her old bed that night the hole in her heart didn’t feel quite so big.

**March 28, 2026**

_Request denied._

Veronica stared at the paper in disbelief.

She’d been working on the memorial project for months, enlisting the help of fellow first-year officers and some older students she’d had classes with and even reaching out to a few of Lance’s classmates, and this was the Garrison’s response?

Denied?

Her eyes skimmed further down, seeking some particular she could adjust; maybe the site request had been too large or they wanted to move its construction to a later time.

But…

_“While we find the proposal a heartfelt and noble one the consensus of the Galaxy Garrison Council was unanimous in that creating a memorial to honor those whose deaths were the result of personal negligence and irresponsibility sends the wrong message for what the Galaxy Garrison represents. We thank you for--”_

Veronica crumpled the letter, shaking with rage.

Negligence?

Irresponsibility?

She still had never gotten answers as to how Lance and his friends happened to come across that site before _trained_ Garrison personnel could stop them. Why Lance would have ignored a direct command to halt. There had to be more to it, there had to be, but answers were just not there. It eerily reminded Veronica of the ill-fated Kerberos mission and how the only answer they’d been given was pilot error was to blame.

She supposed this memorial was just like that one too. Students and staff alike had rallied for one, for all three beloved members of their community, but it too had been denied. 

The Garrison didn’t like to showcase failure.

And although Veronica wasn’t sure what a first year data analyst could do…

She was going to find answers. 

One way or another.

**July 28, 2026**

“Happy birthday, Lance,” Veronica whispered, staring at the single, flickering candle atop the cupcake she’d bought in Garrison City earlier that day.

He would have been eighteen today, a young man.

He would still always be her baby brother.

Her Lancito.

“How… how is it up there?” she asked. “Are the stars as beautiful as they are here?”

She tipped her head back, gazing into the heavens above the Arizona landscape. 

“I don’t know if you saw, but I was promoted last week. First Officer. If you didn’t, thought you’d like to know your sister is becoming a sort of bigshot in the data analyst department. Which, let’s face it, is way cooler than a pilot any day.”

It would also gain her more access to files, to more secure codes. She didn’t know if she would find anything, but…

But she had to try.

She swallowed, looked down from the stars to the candle. “You’d have made a great pilot though. I know you would have. You were always a fighter, Lance. You never gave up. I know you’d have done it; would have made it back to the fighter pilot track. I wish…”

She swallowed thickly, tears stinging her eyes. “I wish you were here.”

And she blew out the candle. 

**October 3, 2026**

Mrs. Garrett’s hand was warm on Veronica’s shoulder as they stood together at Lance’s grave, her son’s a few rows down, on the one year anniversary of their deaths.

She’d known the Garretts practically since the first day they’d settled into their home in America as Lance had dragged in their son within the hour to play hide and seek. She and Luis had grown up playing babysitter often to the two of them along with her other younger siblings and she viewed Hunk as another younger brother although none of them could claim to have the relationship Lance had with him.

The two of them really were brothers in all but blood.

She was glad that at least… at least Hunk had been with Lance when they’d…

At least he hadn’t died alone.

“What do you think those two are getting into?” Mrs. Garrett asked softly. 

“Trouble,” Veronica said flatly and was rewarded by Mrs. Garrett’s rich laugh. 

“Oh those two,” she murmured, shaking her head. “Heaven help heaven.”

Veronica cracked a tiny smile.

“Mrs Garrett?” she asked quietly, hesitantly.

“What is it, dear?”

“What… what would you think if I said that maybe… maybe an asteroid didn’t kill them?”

Because there had been no asteroid.

Veronica had done so much reading on them, on their signatures and radiation and temperatures and makeup that she was surprised her glasses prescription hadn’t increased.

And the readings she’d found for that night?

They matched no asteroid ever seen on Earth.

Never recorded even in space.

So if there was no asteroid strike the night of her brother’s death…

Something else had happened.

Something the Garrison, the organization she had looked up to and admired, was hiding.

She hadn’t dared share her findings with anyone there, not even her closest co-workers. She hadn’t told her family because she could not give them some sort of false hope when she might be digging into nothing. 

But Mrs. Garrett had always been a powerhouse, a literal force of nature, and she had been vocal to the Garrison and to the news when they would not listen to her that she demanded an internal investigation into how three teenagers had bypassed all of the Garrison’s top-notch security and wandered into a site that got them killed.

The Garrison had launched an investigation but the results had been laughable; taking no blame and instead saying one of the students -- Pidge Gunderson -- had a history of hacking and had been able to lift the blackout measures.

That was another thing, Veronica had found.

Pidge Gunderson didn’t exist either beyond the Garrison records.

She knew the boy was real; she’d met him several times via Lance. But outside of that?

It was a mystery inside of a mystery and Veronica was both afraid and determined to crack it wide open.

“Then I would question why the Garrison has been so adamant one did,” Mrs. Garrett said, voice pitched low. “And I would....” her voice became harder. “I would wonder what, or _who,_ actually did.”

Veronica gave a small nod of her head.

She wondered the same thing.

She wondered if the people she served were murderers.

She wondered what three teenagers had seen that would call for their deaths.

She wondered how she would find out.

“Whatever we can do,” Mrs. Garrett said, barely a whisper. “Say it and you have it. We will not,” her hand tightened almost painfully on Veronica’s shoulder, “let them hurt our families any more.”

**December 18, 2027**

Veronica hit a standstill. Her clearance was only taking her so far and she had to be careful as if there was something nefarious happening in the upper echelon…

She could be next and then they would never have answers and therefore justice.

She wondered if that was what happened; if Lance had stumbled across something the Garrison hadn’t wanted anyone to see and so they’d gotten rid of him. 

How far up did it go though? To the Admiral? She had been the one to break the news; had she been briefed it was an unfortunate accident as Veronica had been led to believe or was she in on it?

It didn’t add up.

But Veronica couldn’t move past that. She needed higher codes, more seniority. It was a waiting game, she realized. A long, long waiting game spanning over two years now where she would have to continue to help the organization that may have killed her brother in order to progress up their chain. Officer promotions were next June and if she played her cards right she could rise to Second Lieutenant.

She needed to if she wanted find her answers.

But as it turned out, Veronica didn’t need to wait for a promotion to learn the truth.

It came right to her during family movie night watching “A Miracle on 34th Street.”

She was home for an early Christmas leave, Rachel on break from college and Mamá had proclaimed a family night, calling up Luis and Marco to join them, and hence why Veronica found herself squished into the corner of the family’s old floral patterned sofa next to Luis.

Lance had always been the one to want family nights -- movie nights, game nights, anything to get them all into the same room -- but the memory was more sweet than bitter now.

They were barely twenty minutes into the movie on a local station when it was interrupted by an older looking man sitting at a table with a woman at his shoulder.

“Oh come on!” Marco threw his hands up, “it’s movie time! Ugh, stupid news--”

“Turn it up,” Veronica ordered.

Her voice shook.

She… she knew that man.

 _“_ _\--the wife of famed astronaut, Sam Holt, and mother of Matt Holt,” the woman said. “Two years ago, it was believed that they died during a deep space mission. That was a lie. My husband, along with his crew, were abducted by an alien race known as the Galra, a fact that was covered up by the Galaxy Garrison.”_

“Holy shit,” Marco breathed.

Mamá didn’t even correct him.

Veronica felt like she couldn’t breathe.

Commander Holt was… alive? 

The Kerberos Mission had been a coverup?

Had Lance’s death…?

“ _Dios,”_ Mamá whispered. “Oh, _Dios.”_

Pictures were flashing across the screen now; aliens, they were saying. Galrans. They were coming to attack. But there were heroes who could help them, Paladins of Voltron.

And a video of Hunk Garrett appeared on the screen.

Hunk, who was supposed to be dead alongside Lance.

Veronica shook this time with a hope she didn’t dare believe yet. Because if…

If…

And then he was there.

“Lance,” Rachel whimpered. 

He didn’t look any different, maybe a little more tired, but his eyes were bright as he held a camera trained at him, looking a little embarrassed as he always did when actually recording himself and not for one of his pranks.

Veronica’s heart ached.

He was…

He was _alive._

_“Hi, Mamá. Hi, Papá. It's me, Lance.”_

Mamá began to sob. 

Veronica’s tears ran unchecked.

He was...

_“I'm here in outer space somewhere.I, um, uh, don't really know what to say. I miss you guys. I miss you guys a lot.”_

The video cut off, displaying the boy known as Pidge Gunderson that Veronica distantly realized was actually Sam Holt’s daughter, mind stuck in a reel.

Lance was alive.

The Garrison had lied.

Lance was alive.

The Garrison had lied.

Lance was _alive._

She stood abruptly.

“Veronica?” Luis asked. Tears were dripping down his face to catch in his beard. 

“I’m going,” she said. “Marco, I’m taking your motorcycle.”

“Where?” Rachel managed, voice high and breathy and clutching the cat like her life depended on it.

Veronica’s eyes flashed. “To get answers.”

**December 19, 2026**

Veronica had been all set to make a scene to get access to Commander Holt, no longer caring for images and promotions because _her brother was alive and the Garrison had lied_ but she found she didn’t have to.

Commander Holt had requested her presence as soon as she arrived back on campus.

He told her he’d been on Earth for almost eight months, kept hidden after nearly a month of quarantine from all but a few upper administration and a bunch of students selected for the MFE program. He had tried to wait for the Garrison to do the right thing, but after he’d received contact from his son, who was part of a rebel force, that the Galra were zoning in on Earth due to their attempts at contact and an attack was imminent he had to warn Earth’s citizens.

He was so sorry he had not done so sooner. He was so sorry for her family’s pain and suffering. 

_“My words mean little,”_ he’d murmured, looking less like a commander then and more like a man who had suffered too much, _“and I know they do not make up for the years you and your family have suffered this lie. Right now we must band together, must not allow ourselves to fight from within as a threat you cannot even imagine is coming. But…”_ he’d met her eyes, which were full of an inner fire, “ _when Earth is safe… when our families are home… we will see justice served. We will not allow those who have done wrong go unpunished.”_

He’d explained more about the war, the Paladins of Voltron.

And now that the shock that _Lance was alive_ had worn off Veronica was hit with a new horror.

Her brother, her baby brother, was fighting in a war. On the front lines. 

“ _He is a remarkable young man,”_ Commander Holt, who told her to call him Sam, said softly. “ _All of them are. I know you are worried; I worry too. But they are a strong team. They have each other. And they all want to come home and_ nothing _will stop them from seeing their loved ones again.”_

He asked for her help, her support, in fighting the Galra.

Veronica gave it without hesitation.

**May 3, 2027**

The Galra invaded.

They weren’t ready. 

They lost so…

So many lives.

Admiral Sanda was responsible. 

Veronica would never forgive her. 

That feeling grew as Sanda put the Garrison on lockdown, refusing to let anyone leave because Galra forces were on the ground.

Her _family_ was out there. 

Sam pulled her aside, asked her to wait. He would help. He would not let her family be split apart again. 

They just needed the right time.

**June 17, 2027**

Veronica joined the MFEs on an expedition mission. Her knowledge of the tunnels that ran below the Garrison was invaluable, but so too was her familiarity with weapons.

Lance had gotten his talent from somewhere, she’d smirked. 

“ _Stay safe,”_ Sam whispered, pressing a bag of rations to her far more than one would need on a single day trip before she left.

The mission hadn’t gone entirely to plan, but the result was what Veronica had wanted; the MFEs got the supplies and she made a clean escape to find her way nearly two hundred miles back home.

She could do it.

She would do it. 

She would save her family.

**July 28, 2027**

Lance was nineteen today. 

It was fitting that Veronica made it home on that day.

That her family was there.

That while hungry and exhausted and hiding from Galra troops they were _alive._

Just like Lance was.

And he would be home soon too.

**November 2, 2027**

The war dragged on.

Supplies ran low.

Hope ran lower.

Voltron did not come. 

“He’ll… he’ll be here soon,” Rachel whispered, rocking Nadia in her arms as they sat in the cramped Garrison quarters allotted for the whole family. “He’s alive. He’s coming home.”

**January 19, 2028**

Sanda wanted to order ground troops to fight.

Veronica knew without a doubt they would die. 

They were no match for the Galra.

Sam was feverishly working on a large ship that he had been given blueprints for from the Alteans, the alien race that had nearly been wiped out by the Galra to start the war over ten thousand years ago and were considered to be one of the highest advanced civilizations in the universe.

Veronica helped.

Marco helped.

The whole family did what they could to assist, to make clear that their allegiance in this fight was with Sam, with, to Veronica’s surprise, Iverson, who had come around after Sanda had sacrificed their best pilots in the initial attack. 

But as days dragged by it felt less like they were doing anything and more like they were hiding as the world went to pieces around them.

And still they waited.

**April 8, 2028**

“Where are you?” Veronica whispered, looking up at the star-studded sky that showed nothing of the war waging below it. “Please… come home.”

She looked down, across the desert, where black smoke curled into the sky from the ill-fated battle Sanda had directed (but not fought in, of course not).

“We need you.”

**June 3, 2028**

Sam got a message out. Little spores that were able to bypass the Galran’s defenses.

Maybe, he’d whispered… maybe someone out there would hear them.

Someone would help.

They needed help.

**July 28, 2028**

Lance turned twenty. 

They were down to one-meal rations.

The Atlas was nearly complete except…

Except they could not get it to start.

Hope was a hard thing to find these days.

Veronica made the same wish she did every year on this date, blowing on an invisible candle.

“I wish you were here.”

**October 4, 2028**

They were here.

Voltron.

Not in their Lions, Sam confided to her, gaze drifting towards Sanda with a sad knowing. But they were coming, picked up by the MFEs in the desert. They’d be here soon. Go, he’d given her a little push. 

Veronica had made her way in a daze to the main concourse.

The news had spread and everyone it seemed had come out to stare at the pale blue sky and desert outside the particle barrier where she could make out plumes of dirt being kicked up by the humvees.

Lance was in one of those.

“He’s here,” Rachel whispered, clutching Veronica’s hand and she felt Papá at her back and she couldn’t speak if she wanted to. “He’s h-home.”

The vehicles drove into the Garrison, fanning out.

Her legs shook, unrelated to the ground doing the same at the proximity to the nearest vehicle rumbling away.

Whispers of _“Shirogane,”_ began to ripple through the crowd as said man, hair gray and right arm missing, exited the lead vehicle.

Veronica barely spared him a glance.

Her eyes were on a figure in a vehicle further down the line.

“Lance,” Mamá whispered, taking a shaky step forward. “ _Mijo.”_

And there was no way Lance could have heard her, could have picked out his family in the giant crowd, but somehow his eyes were drawn right to them.

Veronica inhaled.

He looked _exactly_ the same. A little more tired, even moreso than the video, but otherwise he hadn’t changed a bit.

Hadn’t aged a day let alone over three years. 

But his smile…

His smile was the same.

Veronica was aware of her family moving, of being swept up in the rush as Lance _catapulted_ himself from the vehicle and ran towards them, tears visible in the corners of his eyes. 

Nadia and Sylvio broke free and Lance met them, sliding on his knees and nearly being bowled over by his niece and nephew.

He was crying.

He was laughing.

He was _here._

“You’ve gotten so big!” she heard him say through his tears, heard Sylvio say something in return that drew a wet laugh.

And then she was there, at his side.

She couldn’t speak as she wrapped hands about his arm and pressed kisses into his hair, as her family gathered in close in a babble of undecipherable joy and tears.

Lance was _here._

And she would never lose him again.

**Author's Note:**

> * Dates were picked more for the month and day over the year, but to keep things organized and show the timeline I went with a year. I don’t think VLD is set too far into the future (those computers at the Garrison are pretty old school xD) so just a few years out from now.
> 
> Commission fic for brilliantbanshee (4k-5k) of a timeline/vignette fic from Veronica’s perspective starting with Lance’s “disappearance” and going until he arrives back at home and how she and her family are handling those years.
> 
> Enjoy the fic? Please leave a comment! I love hearing from readers and it really means a lot.


End file.
